Make room for man’s furry best friend

I had never considered myself much of a pet person before Dan and Kelly entered my life. In fact, I was quite content with the stone dog that stood watch on my stoop. But when Kelly brought home the first stray cat, I was a goner. Before I knew it, I was a bona fide pet lover with three cats and a dog to prove it.

With the addition of all these furry family members, I had a new decorating challenge on my hands: figuring out how my home décor and our animal menagerie could peacefully co-exist. Through the years, I came up with a bag of tricks to make my home more pet friendly.

But when Kelly left for college, the number of homeless animals taking shelter in our home dropped. As our pets aged, we lost them one by one, until we were left with only Boots. The world's fattest cat, Boots doesn't cause much trouble, so I no longer had to use my pet-proofing tricks.

Life was good without all the pets, I told myself. For the first time in years, my vacuum wasn't full of animal hair, and guests could sit on my sofas and not leave with party favors clinging to their slacks.

But I didn't realize how much I missed having a dog in the house until I spied the world's cutest beagle puppy at a charity auction. My first mistake was to pick her up; she stole a piece of my heart with each sloppy lick she gave me. Dan's first mistake was to give me the auction number, which I thrust in the air over and over again during the heated bidding.

Poof, I owned a puppy, and a very overpriced one at that. In a flash, I had to resurrect my pet-protection policies. If you share your home with animals, you might be able to use a few of my tricks, too.

First, make your upholstered furniture pet proof. Cover your seat cushions with zip off covers that are easy to launder. Run away from fussy fabrics that have to be dry cleaned. If you're buying a new sofa, select fabric that's tan or brown (the color of dirt), or go with a white that can be bleached. To my surprise, I've found my cream-colored furniture is ideal for pets because many of the spot removers I've discovered work best on light fabrics.

Next, protect the spots where your furry friends sleep. I noticed that my cats always dozed on the same seats, so I started covering those chairs with washable throws. My favorite decorative blankets are matelasse coverlets because the more you launder them, the softer and cozier they become. They look darling folded into thirds, then draped over the seat, right where your pet snoozes.

If your cat jumps on your coffee table, or if you have a retriever with a powerful tail capable of clearing a display in two wags, make your tabletop accessories low profile, simple and durable. In place of a conventional coffee table, use a beautifully upholstered ottoman that doesn't need any accessories other than a tray holding a few books. Build more elaborate displays in inaccessible spots like on your mantle or on the shelves of bookcases.

You can also focus your decorating energy on dressing your walls in fabulous art, an area your pets cannot touch. When you're collecting art for your walls, add in some whimsical pieces that pay tribute to your furry friends. My friend Cynthia showed her wry sense of humor when she hung an ornately framed reproduction oil painting of a hound over her dogs' food dishes.

Finally, realize that problems are part of the package when you're a pet owner. In the first weeks we had Sissy, she soiled the carpet, chewed a hole in Dan's good wool coat (which he continues to wear, much to my horror) and gnawed on the kitchen cabinets. Instead of having a melt down, I decided to view the little puppy teeth marks as a sweet memory I can either preserve or sand out and repaint.

Despite any havoc your pets may wreak on your décor, they more than make up for it by helping to make your house a home.

Mary Carol Garrity owns three home furnishings stores in Atchison, Kan., and wrote several books on home decorating. Write to Mary Carol at nellhills@mail.lvnworth.com. Her column is syndicated by Scripps Howard News Service.